


chest filled with diamond and gold

by cateliot



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Control, F/M, Fear, Mechanic and Specialist, Melinda May - Freeform, Pain, Post-Episode: s03e07 Chaos Theory
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-31
Updated: 2016-03-31
Packaged: 2018-05-30 09:36:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,113
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6418297
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cateliot/pseuds/cateliot
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Between Daisy's misguided avoidance techniques and Coulson's personal baggage, Mack has a question he wants to ask the specialist.</p>
            </blockquote>





	chest filled with diamond and gold

Title from Halsey’s _Control_.

::

**_“She was beautiful in the same way a forest fire was beautiful.”_ **

::

He found in her in the attic. 

Her eyes jumped up to his figure for a moment before turning back to the computer running some kind of code in Chinese along with a very large stack of folders that he had never seen before.  She was dressed post mission—he had heard she went through a fifth story window, but her body showed no signs of cuts to his eyes.

“Hey.”

 

The first week May was on vacation the entire agency collapsed.  Coulson had a meltdown.  Daisy was inconsolable.  They had three ops had failed over _paperwork malfunction_.  Who even knew that May was in charge of organizing all the paperwork? 

He called Andrew Garner on the eighth day. 

There was nothing else to do.  May’s phone wasn’t on and he knew that the good doctor was with her.  The Chinese woman had made no attempts to disguise that fact.  Mack was surprised when he picked up.

He was always so damn polite.  Direct, _sure_ , in a sneaky shrink kind of way, but polite. 

“We need her back.”

Garner had sighed, like it was truly painful wherever the hell he had taken May in the Hawaii sunlight.

“It was always going to be an adjustment.  Coulson knew that.”          

“Can I talk to her?”

“Never gonna happen.”  He could tell that Garner was smiling now.

He never realized just how much she did until she wasn’t here.

 

“May I ask you a question?” he kept his voice light, but his intent must have triggered something on the warrior’s radar because her spine straightened, but didn’t turn to face him.

“I suppose that would depend on the question.”

He resisted the urge to wring his hands.  He shouldn’t be nervous. 

 _Really_. 

It was just May. 

But that was something to be nervous about in itself.  She could easily interrogate him, get answers to questions he didn’t even know were being asked before he realized what was going on.  He felt it with Bobbi, when they met—the inescapable feeling of being tinkered with on the inside when she met your gaze.

 

Daisy was avoiding her.  She knew it.  Coulson knew it.  The entire base knew it.  He assumed that May herself knew it too, but he was never one to speculate on the specialist.

At first it was because of guilt and broken bones she caused Afterlife.

And then it was because of the anger at May’s vacation.

And then it was because of Lincoln and his rage towards Andrew Garner.

And now she avoided her because she had been avoiding her. 

 

Mack was pretty sure Coulson was punishing her for leaving.  For going on vacation and not coming back.  For leaving with Dr. Garner.  For not answering her phone.  And now the Director was leaving her all alone standing off to the side in silence, drowning.

He didn’t think the man particularly cruel, sometimes an ineffective leader, sure, an old romantic and annoying stubborn collector (especially about his cars).  But he didn’t find him secretive, or jealous, and cruel.

Until it came to May.

_(“Who’s gonna talk to her?”)_

 

 

“Mack?”

Her eyes were on his face now—she must have turned at some point—and he blinked rapidly to bring himself back to the present conversation. 

“I, uh, was wondering how you do it so well?”

“Do what?”

She raised an eyebrow and her tone wobbled on calm and displeased. 

He quickly elaborated, “I’ve rewatched your tapes from the Academy.  _For Daisy._   Your pulse never beats fasted than 100bpm.  I’ve tried watching Hunter and Bobbi, but he just wings it and Bobbi lives for the adrenaline high.  Jemma says that’s not possible for your heart to beat that slow that unless you’re doing it on purpose.”

 

_How are you so one in the violence around you?_

 

She watched him for a moment and before tilting her head a little to the left, considering her response.  It was strange to see her all alone without Daisy or Coulson or Andrew nearby, Mack noticed. 

Parts of her reminded him of his mother with her unwavering ability to sense other’s pain and take it away. 

She had always been there, contently hidden in her shadows.

And then part of her that were so exotic that he could help but consider Hunter’s drunken theory that May was really an Asguardian warrior who decided to settle here on earth.  Her calmness in the face of bullet and generally unflappable nature was as inhuman as any human he had met.

And before her impromptu vacation he would have continue to believe that she was all zen and peacefully contained, but it seemed that Andrew had done quite the job of shattering her façade because even standing here, he could her mask shimmer, like a smashed up force field, vulnerable and exposing the true flames underneath.

All blistering, hot, and painful.

 

Not answering, she advanced on him with intent.  She walked towards him with a grace no one else on the base possessed, straight into his personal space.  It was out of character; he had never seen anyone other than Coulson stand so close to her. 

He had never understood how small she was until that moment.  Her tiny bone structure and smooth muscle groups.  (They had never been in such close proximity before.) And he could smell the jasmine of her shampoo, calming and exotic in the air.

He could crush her, he realized, if he could ever catch her that was.  But in that moment, she completely held the upper hand.

Until her hand reached across their bodies. 

 

What happened next, happened quickly and it wasn’t until later that he really remembered what all went down. 

Her hand curled around the gun on the end of the table and fired a single shot into the wooden desk behind them, sending him jumping back from her with the crack of the bullet and rebound.

“ _Jesus_ _!_   Wha the—why the hell would you—?”

A whisper of a smirk echoed on her lips. 

And almost immediately, her nimble fingers curled around his wrist and he could feel her fingers press firmly onto his pulse, radiating his racing heartbeat. 

“You were frightened.”

“So it’s about fear?” He forced himself to meet her gaze.  Her large brown eyes were foggy, almost like she wasn’t even looking at him, though he could clearly see her focused on his every eye twitch and breath.  Psychoanalyzing them.

“No.”

His eyebrows contracted almost immediately and he opened his mouth to ask for a better explanation when one came anyways.

“It’s about control.”

**Author's Note:**

> Another look at May through a different teammates' POV. Comments and feedback are always appreciated!


End file.
